Building a Playchoice-10 From Spare Parts

Phetishboy

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Remember that song about the dude who built a car from spare parts he had smuggled out of the factory he worked at in his lunch box? I loved that song when I was a kid.

Anyway, some of you may know that I recently restored a single monitor Playchoice-10 for myself. Well, the manager of my Gym wanted to buy one for his son real bad, but wasn't looking to spend the $1500 I'd need for the one I restored. So I decided to build one for him from spare parts and charge him a quarter of that price. I had a DK cab painted black (with transformer and coin door), a SM motherboard and 5 extra PC-10 carts, a Vs. harness and Vs. control panel, a red tent control panel harness (for buttons 3 & 4), a silver Nintendo power supply and a 3/16" piece of smoked plexi that I had cut for a Nintendo cab a few years back that I never used.

First I needed to add 2 buttons to the Vs. CP to cover the extra 2 buttons needed for the PC-10 system for a total of 8. Now many of you may be saying, but Phetishboy, doesn't the PC-10 system utilize a total of 9 buttons, requiring you to add 3 to the Vs. CP? Well concerned KLOVer, the 9th button would be 'reset', which becomes disabled when the dips on the motherboard are set for freeplay. Why set the dips to freeplay you ask? Because doing so disables the timer, which is:

a. Annoying
2. Not needed
c. I didn't have an extra one anyway

But Phetty, how do you reset the machine now? By pressing Channel Select and Enter at the same time you prick, now just shut up and let me finish. After I populated the CP, I needed to wire it. I used the cp harness from a Red Tent, as it had the correct wires for the extra buttons. Once I finished wiring the CP, I used 'half' a red tent/vs. harness to wire the cab. By half, I mean that all the wires on the solder side of the edge connector were cut off, as they were not gonna be utilized in this single monitor set-up. Once I got it all wired, I hooked it up to test it. Everything seemed to be working.

Next I loaded up the motherboard with the 5 titles we agreed upon. His main choices were Tecmo Bowl and Mike Tyson's Punchout. He also chose Pro Wrestling, Rad Racer and Double Dragon to round out the 5. I made him aware that he does have 5 more slots to fill, and he knows all about eBay, so he should have a fully loaded Playchoice in no time.

Next I needed to make a black paper bezel for the monitor, as this cab had none. I decided to make it 2 inches wider than the inside of the cabinet so that I could bend down an inch wide tab on either side to staple it to the cab. I did this so that it would stay in place, even if the mounting tabs on the face of the monitor let loose over time (which they always seem to). After that, I grabbed the 3/16 inch smoked plexi and masked the center viewing area and sprayed a nice black frame around the outside with Black Krylon Fusion. I sprayed the inside of the bezel, so that it couldn't be scratched or wiped off. It also then cannot be seen through the tint until the monitor is fired up.

Now, since I used a modified Vs. CP in place of the dedicated PC-10 CP, I knew I needed to come up with some way to label the buttons so that he and his son knew how to operate the menu and start up a game. I decided to utilize the dead space on the 2 inch by 22.5 inch black board above the CP by designing a custom instruction sticker that spanned the width of said board. I sent the file off to Rich and other than a mis-cut at the top, causing it to sit slightly crooked, it turned out pretty nice.

Now, I realize that this is not a collector machine as the parts are used and not some are not factory correct, but this guy is not a collector and couldn't care less. He just wanted a nice arcade machine that he and his son could play some of his favorite NES classics on. All I have left is to find or make a marquee, as the one I had purchased never showed up. Here are some pics of the Bezel, CP area and custom sticker (and yes that is a nice big dent in the front of the CP, I DID say that this was built from spare parts):

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Looks good! You should have Rich print you a marquee from the file we worked on. Just have him change it from Playchoice-60 to Playchoice-10.

LOVE the custom instruction sticker. AWESOMENESS.

How's the little one?
 
Nice I actually really like your button label design. It's actually better than the original IMO.

Thanks Dan, It woulda been nice to have a few test prints first, but I kinda needed this in a hurry and it worked out well. I picked the colors of the arrows to match the buttons, so even if they were slightly out of alignment they would still look right. The best part is that now the freeplay reset function is spelled out on the sticker, rather than having to figure it out for yourself like I had to when I first started collecting. I also always thought the dedicated PC-10 CP had too much writing on it. Besides that, the statement "play several games while time remains" is a moot point when the game is set to freeplay. Looking at the way the sticker interacts with the CP, it kinda reminds me of the Dual Monitor CP, where they bent up the top part to house the extra buttons.
 
You gotta admit, the original is gorgeous, but it seems to be covered in full sentences of type. Most of what's on it is unnecessary for the average schmoe:

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This is just simpler. Not as elegant, but simpler:

DSC00334.jpg
 
yeah too much small text on the original that no one wants to read and even those who do are usually confused and just end up randomly pushing buttons. Simpler is better in most cases and definitely in this one IMO.
 
The way you kept running it down, I was expecting it to look pretty crappy, but that thing is sweet. Plus, now I know that you can set a playchoice to freeplay. I wish I'd know that 2 years ago. It never occurred to me to look.
 
Great looking unit for what it is. What was your price on this as I am curious? Am trying to talk the wife into letting me add a Playchoice to build up my collection and wish there were some people in my area that would build and sell these. Think a lot of people in their 30s and 40s would buy them.
 
Thanks guys, the only thing that sucks is that the damn decal sits slightly crooked. I lined it all up with the top and left side, but since it was mis-cut at the top it was off an eighth of an inch over the 22.5" span. Not horrible but noticeable to me. The adhesive was super strong or I woulda tried peeling it back up and realigning it. Oh well, thank God I don't have to look at it much longer. If there is one thing I am OCD about it's when things are out of level.

I am most happy that the Vs. parts worked out so well. A month ago, when I agreed to build this for him, I had no idea if it would even work.
 
Thanks guys, the only thing that sucks is that the damn decal sits slightly crooked.

Don't sweat it, man. It looks more authentic that way. Lots of the dedicated machines had all kinds of things crooked on them. The facory workers made mistakes too.

If it's too perfect, it's not believable.
 
Well, I decided to whip up a PC-10 marquee from memory and I took a few liberties with it. It matches my instruction sticker better than an original would, and I never understood why they took the '10' out of the marquees on the single monitor version. They kept it in the dual monitor, so I'm putting it back in.

playchoiceMarqueeSticker.jpg
 
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